President Obama  proposed a plan to reduce the deficit by $4 trillion over 12 years, made up of a combination of spending cuts and tax increases on the richest Americans, while also slamming a Republican plan recently unveiled by GOP Rep. Paul Ryan.

In an afternoon speech, Obama said the sky-high deficit must be tackled But before outlining his vision for reducing the deficit, Obama launched a blistering attack on Ryan's plan, which he called "deeply pessimistic" about the country's future. He took aim at its plan to change Medicare into a voucher program, give states near-total control of Medicaid funds with block grants, and make big cuts in areas like education, coupled with further tax cuts for the richest Americans.

 "In the last decade the average income of the bottom 90 percent of all working Americans actually declined. Meanwhile the top one percent saw their income rise by an average of more than a quarter of a million dollars each. That's who needs to pay less taxes? They want to give people like me a $200,000 tax cut that's paid for by asking 33 seniors each to pay $6,000 more in health costs. That's not right. And it's not going to happen as long as I'm president." 

Obama said he's proposing what he called a "more balanced approach." Of the $4 trillion proposed deficit reduction, Obama said $2 trillion should come from spending cuts, including $400 billion from the military and $480 from Medicare and Medicaid, $1 trillion from increased taxes on the wealthy, including ending the Bush tax cuts, and the rest gained from lower interest payments on the national debt.

 House Speaker John Boehner calling it a, "non-starter."

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